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Monday, March 21, 2011

My backyard tragedy

As you can see in my header, I have a beautiful little Japanese maple tree in our backyard. So, I was horrified when I went outside to de-leaf and de-crap our planting beds last weekend and discovered this:

A huge branch was snapped off my beloved tree, which was a gift from my mom in 2009.

And a few other smaller ones also fell off.

And now my poor little tree looks like this.

I hope losing such a large portion of branches doesn't cause problems for the tree? I can only imagine this had something to do with Snowmaggedon, or maybe some fatass squirrel was jumping onto the branches, I'm not sure. I'm also not sure what I was smoking when I left all this mess last fall:

This area usually looks nice and tidy, like this....

It looked like the Silver Reed grasses were coming to strangle me with their tenticles!

It took me hours to cut everything down, and clean up the mounds of leaves from the ground. I think it's extremely unfair that we have NO large trees in our front or back yard, yet we have leaves EVERYWHERE! BAH!

Glimerace the frog was pretty much buried by the time I got the lawn bag out. Stupid leaves!

The only good thing I saw during my cleanup was this:

My hydrangeas are already starting to bud! Champions, I tell ya. I'm guessing I still have about 48 hours of cleanup ahead of me on the other sides of the backyard....

Tub full of mud and water? Oh, hell no! Sara from last fall: you suck.

29 comments:

Oh my gosh, that looks like our backyard drama! Phx got like three unexpected freezes this winter and that really set our plants back. Of course, we were just getting things how we wanted them right before that... and now back to square one...okay square two... but still. I don't think we out and out lost anything, but things aren't very pretty right now. It will all look good again soon, I'm sure, though!

Gotta love that Spring time clean up! Sorry to hear [and see] about your maple... I lol'd about the fat ass squirrel comment, although it would totally suck if that was the cause, it would be kind of funny just to see a really fat ass squirrel.

I raked up last year's leaves on the weekend too. Look at it that they were cozy winter coverage for your plants and now you are taking them off so they can breathe ... much better than thinking you were a slacker!!!

I hope your tree bounces back. I think they're hardy trees so all is not lost. I'm dealing with the same clean up this spring--truthfully, I don't know when to cut back plants so I just left them all. Now I have half dead, half new growth plants--not fun!

On a funny gardening side note: I was babysitting my nieces the other day and I decided to go outside and pull up weeds. They wanted to help but I sent them off looking for four leaf clovers instead. I should have been watching because a few minutes later my 4 year old niece runs up saying "Aunt Karrie, look at this big weed I found!"--it was a mum I planted last year. haha!

We have to head out into our backyard this weekend. It's a chore, but when done, and everything is blooming and we can sit out and enjoy a glass of wine while sitting by the pond, it is well worth it. Hope your maple survives. Be sure to put some pruning sealer on the spots the branches broke off so no insects/disease gets in.

So sad for your tree, but I'm sure it will be fine. Love to see that glimpse of green though. I took a look around our yard this morning and my lilac has developed buds, and some lilies are poking up through the ground. Too bad we are going to get another dusting of snow tonight :(

Your Japanese Maple should be fine. Just make sure to baby it for a little while until it heals up. I'm jealous that you can grow them over there. We aren't that far away but everyone in my garden club has had not luck keeping them alive. Bummer.

The leaves are very healthy for the plants both as mulch and if you don't rake them nutrients. They look messy in the beds though. I started a leaf mold pile last year (rake up leaves, shred with either a lawn mower or a weed whacker in a trash can, and put in a pile over winter). When they are shredded they decompose faster and what you get is very rich black compost! It's called black gold in the gardening community and people pay big bucks for it. If you have space for a small pile you should try it out!

Aw, I'm sad that you have so much hard work ahead of you, but your writing cracks me up! You and your fatass squirrels. :o) Kudos to you for your efforts; my backyard is SO white trash right now, it's shameful.

After a muddy winter and lots of games of fetch, my backyard is hopeless. Just worn in grass-less mud trails from where Nemo ran over and over again. Completely and utterly hopeless. Thankfully no one sees our backyard but us.

About Me

My name is Sara. I am a home owner/renovator, photographer, and stay at home mom in the Chicago area trying to cram all kinds of projects into the time my son is at school. Ashford is 3, and I had our second baby Zach December 2015, so things are pretty busy around here! I like slightly inappropriate humor, wine, and stalking house blogs. I love starting new DIY projects and sometimes hate finishing them. I love taking portraits of families, children and couples whenever I can. This blog is all about the projects my husband and I tackle, the projects that fizzle, and the funny things that happen to us along the way.